To take advantage of opportunities/solve problems, the need for a greater than local/cross-boundary approach can be seen. Regional cooperation is the nominal tool, yet the goal is to be greater; have greater capacity, resources, market,…. Greater is regional; working across boundaries achieves it. Cooperation is possible when people recognize such regional community. This is regional intelligence: Greater Communities solving problems, of which security is foremost; altogether “community motive.”

When cities cooperate with their regional neighbors, everyone benefits, Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper told Commerce Lexington members at a breakfast meeting yesterday.

Cooperation with surrounding communities has been a hallmark of Hickenlooper's administration since he was elected four years ago. Lexington Mayor Jim Newberry said he hopes Hickenlooper's style rubs off on Central Kentucky leaders.

Hickenlooper, a geologist turned entrepreneur, had never held public office when he was elected mayor of Denver in 2003.

Soon after taking office, he invited mayors and elected officials from surrounding cities for a get-acquainted session, ushering in an era of bipartisan regional cooperation.

Issues they have tackled regionally include economic development, transportation, arts promotion and merger of fire departments. One of Hickenlooper's first steps was to assure the mayor of Aurora, Colo., that Denver would not try to steal companies from his city.

Any business that wanted to move from Aurora to Denver could move. "For any new jobs they create, we will give them the same incentives we would give to anyone else, " Hickenlooper said. "But the existing job base they have, we will give no incentive for that. We will never try to poach your businesses."

…

It matters more that a company moves to the Denver area than specifically where it is located, he said. Denver now has similar agreements with four other large neighbors.

Newberry said regional issues were important in the Bluegrass and he had hoped to move quickly on them when elected 11 months ago. But "a lot of basic, operational issues in urban county government have taken an inordinate amount of time to clean up, " he said.

Lexington's track record as a neighbor "has not been that good. We need to mend wounds we inflicted in the past, " he added.

Someone has pulled the stopper from the bathtub and all the water is draining out!

Metro Atlanta and North Georgia, as well as most of the Southeast, is in the grip of what may prove to be the worst drought on record. At the same time, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is releasing extreme amounts of water from Lake Lanier — our region's key water supply source — to enhance the habitat of two species of mussels and to keep a small coal-fired power plant in operation.

When Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans, it was considered a natural disaster. Our impending disaster, on the other hand, is man-made, but can be averted by reasoned leadership on the part of President Bush and two federal agencies — the Corps of Engineers and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

Gov. Sonny Perdue filed suit late last week on behalf of the state of Georgia to prevent the Corps of Engineers from completely draining Lake Lanier and the Chattahoochee River. On Saturday, the governor declared 85 counties disaster areas due to the drought and called upon President Bush to issue a federal disaster declaration and to order less water to be released from the federally controlled Buford Dam/Lake Lanier system.

In addition, Georgia's congressional delegation banded together in a bold and unprecedented move last week to sponsor legislation to suspend the Endangered Species Act under certain conditions of extreme drought, where health and human welfare is at risk.

The elected officials of metro Atlanta's counties and cities thank these officials for their bold efforts. We join them on behalf of the more than 4 million citizens who depend on Lake Lanier and the Chattahoochee River for our lifeblood — in sending an urgent plea to the Corps of Engineers to act with haste …

One good outcome of our record drought is that we as a region and a state can finally enact sound water policies.

As a region, we need to direct all new developments to areas served by sewer systems, and we need to start installing water and sewer systems in areas dependent on septic tanks.

Here's why. Households with septic tanks are much poorer stewards of water than households on sewer systems.

"We should be encouraging any new development to occur on sewer systems because homes with septic tanks use seven times as much water as homes on sewer, " says Sam Williams, president of the Metro Atlanta Chamber of Commerce. "That's because septic tanks don't return water back into the rivers and streams."

Some may debate whether septic tanks have seven times more net consumption of water than sewer. But there's no question that sewer systems flow to sewage treatment plants, which return the treated water to our fragile water supply within days.

By comparison, the water used by septic tanks seeps into the ground, likely taking years before it finds its way to our rivers and streams.

It's a particularly acute problem for metro Atlanta, where about one-fourth of all households in the 16-county area are served by septic tanks.

"That's more septic tanks than any other big metro area in the country, " Williams says.

Worse, of all urban areas, metro Atlanta has more reason to be conservative with water use.

"We are the largest metro area relying on the smallest primary water supply of any other metropolitan area in the United States, " says Jim Durrett, executive director of the Livable Communities Coalition.

So we are a region with the most septic tanks and the most limited supply of water. That's a real problem for metro Atlanta and all the communities downstream.

A 30-year outlook compiled by the Baltimore Metropolitan Council, which includes Baltimore, its six surrounding counties and Annapolis, was universally panned this summer for its lack of transit planning.

Area officials received the revised plan earlier this month after sending it back to the drawing board. The second go-around shuffles more of the region's anticipated $8 billion federal allotment to transit, but still remains heavy on the road projects, to the dismay of some participating jurisdictions.

The council cut six projects from the plan - none in Anne Arundel - and reallocated the $240 million savings to support expanding the Red Line in Baltimore. Additional transit modes could be included in the next plan, expected in four years, officials said.

"It's going to take some time, " said Harvey Bloom, the council's transportation director. "We're going to be doing a lot of fact gathering and research."

The regional priorities mirror the state's construction slate, which was presented to the County Council last week during an annual visit from Maryland Department of Transportation officials, who pleaded its case for a gas-tax increase. Faced with a $40 billion backlog of projects in Maryland, state officials said they lacked the funds to invest in new - and expensive - transit modes versus cheaper road projects.

Mass-transit advocates said key players have never articulated a single, unified vision for the region's transportation needs.

…

"There's no lack of opportunities for discussion, " he said. "The key is the money."

Mr. Leopold said the county needs to mount a "full-court press" to secure the funds necessary to build more transit options.

In total, more than 12, 000 workers keep the Cape's government services running, according to data from the state Department of Labor and Workforce Development.

If nothing is done to change numbers like these, said demographics expert Peter Francese, the Cape could face an uncertain economic future.

"I would do whatever it took to reduce the overhead associated with the vast number of political entities, " Francese told a group of more than 300 business leaders and policymakers gathered Friday at an economic summit in Hyannis organized by the Cape Cod Chamber of Commerce. "It will be hard, but the fact of the matter is it is essential for your survival."

When he introduced the idea, he acknowledged that the approach may not be popular given New England's strong tradition of local government.

...

Many summit attendees were cautiously enthusiastic.

"If we did more regional planning, we could still deliver a certain level of service but at lesser cost, " Steve Abbott, president and CEO of Cape Cod Healthcare, said yesterday.

...

Paul Niedzwiecki, the new executive director of the Cape Cod Commission and former assistant town manager of Barnstable, said that it may be difficult to consolidate existing services such as schools and emergency services.

New initiatives, such as alternative energy projects, may be easier to regionalize, he said.

Other participants in the economic summit pointed out some of the barriers to regionalization.

Chamber chairman Richard Neitz on Friday said that the idea should be looked at, but also expressed concern about municipal workers who could lose their jobs if certain functions are consolidated.

The annual conference of the Appalachian Regional Commission was held last week in Charleston, and while this federal agency was quick to trumpet the positive trickle-down on money it has spent in its never-ending battle on rural poverty, the stark reality of the situation is that the region may likely never catch up with the rest of the country.

ARC has long been looked upon as being the catalyst for piecing together financing on basic infrastructure projects, namely water, sewer and highways. It has more recently gotten into providing fiscal support for Internet access and other telecommunications needs.

All quality of life services that are needed — again, the basics.

But as was the case when the ARC was formed in the 1960s, the challenges to provide the basics remain monumental.

A trio of areas present the most pressing needs — one, funding; two, new construction; and three, maintenance and repair of existing infrastructure.

According to a two-year study conducted by Jeff Hughes, director of the Environmental Finance Center at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, $40 billion alone is needed to simply provide water and sewer to those in Appalachia who still go without.

No matter how you figure it, that’s staggering.

Hughes labeled it a “big, scary number, ” but encouraged those making the decisions not to let it stop them from moving forward. He suggested pooling resources as one possible way to deal with some of the needed new projects.

That’s the way most infrastructure projects in Appalachia happen already and we believe it is an approach that should be followed.

But Hughes also warned of some other unsettling issues as it pertains to water and sewer.

With water sources across the state running dry, the State Water Infrastructure Commission is considering ways regionalization could help.

"We have the ability, now I believe, to step up and to influence some of the thinking around what happens going forward with regard to water management [and] water infrastructure, " said Jean Crews-Klein, who is with the State Water Infrastructure Commission.

For more than one year, the group has looked at the pros and cons of regionalizing community water systems. Altogether, North Carolina has more than 500 publicly-run water systems, meaning they are run by cities, towns or counties.

The commission's primary conclusion is that the state should remove barriers to regional cooperation but only in places where it makes sense. The group says regional agreements will not necessarily work for communities separated by far distances.

"We really need to be looking at all possible things that we can do to encourage [regionalization] in the face of what we're facing now, ” Crews-Klein explained.

Almost the entire state is facing a drought that keeps getting worse. Forecasting trends show it will not get better anytime soon.

"We've never seen the likes of it. A drought is always supposed to be a slow-moving creature, but not in this case, " said Woody Yonts, who is with the North Carolina Division of Water Resources.

The State Water Infrastructure Commission says a sharing agreement would benefit communities during such a drought. One way is by allowing them to pull water from more than one source.

A special police unit with members from Madison Heights, Hazel Park, Royal Oak and Ferndale will continue to be funded, officials announced last week.

On Oct. 8, City Council approved an agreement between the member cities that will continue to fund the Southeast Oakland County Crime Suppression Task Force. The plan formalizes the taskforce for the first time in its 10-year history.

“CSTF has been very successful in meeting its goals, ” Madison Heights Police Chief Kevin Sagan wrote to City Council, “and assisting agencies’ detectives in addressing criminal activity through surveillance, detection and criminal apprehension.”

The group also includes officers from the Oakland County Sheriff’s Office and Michigan State Police, which are in charge of the taskforce’s operations.

“The Police Department has been working with that unit ever since it was set up with a grant, ” said City Manager Jon Austin. “We’re all funding it now. They never formalized themselves as a group, but they continued to function.”

Austin said a number of concerns arose in recent years about the structure of the special taskforce. An advisory panel approved a plan in recent weeks to create a so-called “interlocal agreement, ” which outlines the group’s structure and the responsibilities of the member cities.

“The question has come up about everybody’s responsibilities for insurance and things like that, ” said Austin. “The best way to formalize the group would be to establish an ‘interlocal agreement.’ Nothing changes other than we’ve created an agreement.”

Under the plan, each member-city must provide the taskforce with one officer, a police vehicle and all the accoutrements that the officer might need to perform his duties.

Austin dismissed the idea that the agreement is another attempt at joining services between cities in southeastern Oakland County. The group has been operating since 1997, Austin said, and the agreement is not connected to plans to join the fire departments of these same member-cities.

The study, prepared by Innovation Associates, a consulting firm in Reston, Va., highlighted a number of smaller programs that are developing new technologies through academic research, licensing the inventions, and helping launch businesses that use them. With fewer resources than the big players, however, these schools have to think creatively to contribute to the greater economic development of their state or region.

Technology transfer, the process of turning scholarly work into a marketable and practical product or service, spans a broad range of possibilities. In other words, it's not necessarily about coming up with the next iPod. "Innovation is not always high-tech, " says Diane Palmintera, president of Innovation Associates and lead author of the study. "Innovation and new technology businesses can be based on advancement in different fields."

Leveraging the strengths of a university, Palmintera adds, can help it compete. For example, she says the University of Pittsburgh is finding success by getting funding from the National Institutes of Health and spinning off biotechnology businesses and Iowa State University carved out a niche in agriculture.

Engines of Local Development

One of the concepts that infuses the entrepreneurial culture of such programs in rural areas is "think globally, act locally." Because the school provides licenses or seed funding and office space, the companies often feel indebted to it and to the state or region. As a result, all parties involved share the goal of contributing to the economic development of the university's home state, region, or even country, depending on the potential magnitude of the business at hand.

…

Use It or Lose It

Universities have always played a role in economic development. After all, it's their responsibility to educate the workforce and keep U.S. employees ahead of the pack, …

10. U.S. regional communities - sub-State, State or multi-State -in news articles. Highlighted words are Google search terms. In this and the following section, links to websites of organizations are added to the news excerpt when this is the first time an organization has been found. A goal of this newsletter is to find every regional council in the U.S. in a news story. In most cases, where a full name is present a Google search will quickly get one to that organization.

.10No plans for Tennessee River to quench Ga.Knoxville News Sentinel - Knoxville, TN, USAGeorgia, Alabama and Florida, along with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, have been locked in a long-running dispute over a river basin shared by the three states. Ultimately, Reece said, there may need to be a federal water plan that looks at water supply issues on a countrywide basis to avoid those kinds of regional battles. ...

.14Safe water a tough issueMuskogee Daily Phoenix - Muskogee, OK, USAJoe Harrington, deputy executive director of Eastern Oklahoma Development District, said regionalization of drinking water supplies will be one of the most ...

.16BILLS EYE TORONTO TILTNational Post - Canada"This extension of the regionalization effort is designed to enhance the viability and competitiveness of the franchise in Western New York. ...

.17Chamber summit looks at consolidating servicesYoungstown Vindicator - Youngstown, OH, USAThe chamber presented experts during a Regionalization Summit at the Holiday Inn MetroPlex on the concept. They urged local officials to get behind its ...

.19Cincinnati was wise to invest in clean waterCincinnati Post - OH, USACincinnati City Manager Milton Dahoney is now studying whether to transform GCWW from a city department into a regionally focused water district. ...

.23National Association of Regional CouncilsKansas City Star - MO, USAMission: To advocate for regional cooperation as the most effective way to address a variety of community planning and development opportunities and issues. ...

.24Economist: Going green pays dividendsBy WMNF But while regional cooperation seems to have worked in Portland, Dingfelder was concerned about whether all of the city and county governments of the Tampa Bay region could put aside their differences and work together for regional ...

.25Advantage looks back at the yearCharleston Gazette - Charleston, WV, USA"Let's promote regionalism and a regional identity, " she said. "It's a concerted effort." This year has been a year of transition, with Herron joining as ...

.27Rural Economic Development Study to be ExpandedInside INdiana Business (press release) - Indianapolis, IN, USAThe study is being conducted by Purdue University's Center for RegionalDevelopment and the Indiana Business Research Center at Indiana University's Kelley ...

.28Lobbying isn't the problem, corruption isLos Angeles Times - CA, USAYou need someone to state your case to the guy behind the counter, the Area Planning Commission, the full Planning Commission, the City Council and the ...

.31Rural vets are a dying breedHouston Chronicle - United States"We got to focus on more regionalized (animal) hospitals instead of single-man practices." When Golla left school he started a mixed-animal practice in ...

The State Government has decided to create District Planning and Monitoring Unit (DPMU) in each district to extend support to the district to extend support to the district planning committee in the formulation of district plan....

.11BC rejects idea of metro policeGlobe and Mail - CanadaBC has set up several cross-jurisdictional policing teams that draw members from municipal forces and the RCMP to deal with specific areas of crime. ...

.12Arab world faces serious intellectual challengeKhaleej Times - Dubai, United Arab Emirates...prominent Arab thinkers, researchers and academics to formulate strategies to raise the standard of knowledge, research and university education in the region....

.13Come home, QueenslandersNEWS-com-au - AustraliaIn a bid to help alleviate the state's skills crisis, the Department of RegionalDevelopment has developed the slogan: "Come home, Queenslanders – it's a ...

.1625 - Super Regions infra projects finished by 2010Balita-org - Minsterley, England, UKThrough the Super Regions concept, Ebdane said, development is being brought back to the people at a faster rate in terms of physical infrastructure, development of human capital and peaceful communities. ...

.18'Still surviving'St. John's Telegram - St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador, CanadaIn the case of harbour authorities, regionalization might be one of the few escape hatches for some. “I think regionalization may be the way to go in the ...

.19Arena, water will stay on trackBrooks Bulletin - Alberta, CanadaThe arena and water regionalization plans will follow the path laid out by the previous council, said Shields. He also indicated that he will be resigning ...

.20Challenges ahead in institutional reformChina Daily - ChinaThe core of central-regional government relations is the distribution of power while the changing of government functions is the premise and basis to ...

.21China in new phase of world integrationChina Daily - China... participating in and promoting international and regional cooperation, getting proactive about peace-keeping and peace-building missions and extending ...

.22China: New Leaders, Old ProblemsBusiness Week - USAA more balanced development focus also points to Beijing's intention to promote regional growth across China so that the inner provinces don't continue to ...

12. Blogs: Highlighted words are Google search terms.

.10Rust Belt DiasporaBy Jim Russell(Jim Russell) The hypothesis is that a city's connectivity with its urban peers is displacing the importance of the economic interdependence within a region. In this regard, regionalization fails to improve a city's place in the global economy. ...

.11Chicago, IndianaRegionalism means to consider Chicago as a metropolitan area beyond its city limits and to include its surrounding counties when it comes to planning and development. But what makes up this larger area? ...

.14edmonton election 2007: the undiscovered country.By daveberta(daveberta) Unless the provincial government takes a strong role in creating a regional cooperation and cost-sharing framework, it will be unlikely that the dozens of cities, towns, villages, and counties in the region will come to a decision ...

.16Rise of the the Mega-RegionsBy Creative Class Group ... in the first quarter of the year, New York City's economy grew by 4 per cent. Our own research confirms this. So, hot off the press here's a link to our new research identifying the 40 mega-regions that truly drive the world economy. …

.17Texas Triangle a Top 10 Global Mega-RegionBy Tory Gattis(Tory Gattis) Unfortunately, something in their methodology led them to split Texas into two mega-regions, the Dallas-San Antonio corridor, and the Houston-New Orleans corridor, extending all the way the Florida panhandle (see map on p.27). ...

.19Taxing Our Way Out of CongestionBy James Edward Maule(James Edward Maule) The story explains that the Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission released a study in which in concluded that a viable way to ease congestion would be to impose local taxes or fees. The Commission looked at 23 different taxes and ...

.20"Louisiana Speaks" Joins the BlogosphereBy Lamar White, Jr Regional evacuation and economic development projects such as I-49 from Lafayette to metro New Orleans, La. 20/24 from Houma to I-10, and US 165 north of Lake Charles · Key local connections with regional evacuation and economic ...

.21Are Competitive MLSs Possible or Desireable?By Michael Wurzer The demand for regionalization is based on real pain (inefficiency) being experienced by large, regional brokers dealing with multiple MLSs having disparate rules and data sets across many boundaries. Forming regional MLSs, however, ...

.22The Organization of American States: On its deathbed?By admin Regionalism has shown that it is an important intermediate step on the path toward internationalism; how can a disruptive and fragmented region possibly assert itself on the world stage? Therefore, while Chávez and other populist ...

.23Regionalism for DevelopmentBy Supachai Panitchpakdi In particular, our research found that developing countries should strengthen regional cooperation with other developing countries, and proceed carefully with regard to North-South bilateral agreements. ...

.24Excessive Nationalism and Blurring of Local IdentitiesBy Sujai Excessive nationalism when not really in use sometimes vents itself as other isms- such as regionalism or communalism. As a corollary, certain groups starting out with parochial and radical regionalisms and communalisms get legitimacies ...

.25On a safe placeBy G Hansson(G Hansson) In Skåne the experience of regional government is considerable and the opinion firm in favour of regionalism. In Gävle the debate hasn't started yet. The new central leadership talks about the "New Moderaterna". ...

.26Political Stability and Infrastructure.By marta13 The EU has been very successful in accomplishing its goals by the help of present informal capitalism and regionalization. The regionalization does not mean one country, instead it is known as one economy. The richer members facilitate ...

.27The Platform of the Democratic Party of VirginiaBy The Richmond Democrat(The Cheshire Cat) We also support regional cooperation to foster growth across political boundaries in urban and rural areas. We support Enterprise zones in central cities. We favor continuing efforts to preserve family farms through funding of the ...

.30About ASEANBy denith(Laibeus Lord) ... the Gulf Cooperation Council, the Rio Group, the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation, the South Pacific Forum, and through the recently established Asian-African Sub-Regional Organisation Conference. ...

On November 6—one year out from the ‘08 elections—the Metropolitan Policy Program will launch a new national competitiveness initiative, Blueprint for American Prosperity: Unleashing the Potential of a Metropolitan Nation. The Blueprint offers a powerful and compelling argument: The ability of the United States to compete globally and to meet the great economic, environmental and social challenges of the 21st century rest largely on the health, vitality and prosperity of the nation’s major cities and metropolitan areas.

Regional growth and development patterns have profound implications for how we live. They determine whether we live near quality jobs that allow us to support our families; whether we live in healthy communities with access to public transit and quality-of-life amenities; and whether our communities are plagued with poor air and water quality, deteriorating schools, and inadequately maintained roads and bridges.

Regional Equity ’08 will offer participants a venue for in-depth exploration of the groundbreaking achievements, innovative strategies, and lasting policies that connect low-income/low-wealth communities to resources and opportunity. In New Orleans, where the world bore painful witness to the lingering inequities this society still faces, we will build on the issues that were framed at the Philadelphia Summit in May 2005. ...

The Florida Regional Community Policing Institute (RCPI) at St. Petersburg College provides progressive public safety training in Florida, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico. Cutting edge topics include: planning and responding to WMD incidents, human trafficking, ethics and integrity, sexual predator/offender awareness, dealing with the mentally ill, and problem solving strategies in community policing. Many of these courses are available online. Award-winning interactive school safety CD-ROMs and videos, written for today's young people, are available nationwide to schools, law enforcement and youth organizations.

The sub-programme on regional cooperation and integration aims at promoting policies, methods and strategies for increasing regional and subregional cooperation through implementation of sectoral integration, in particular the development of trade and movement of information and persons and for utilization of minerals and other natural resources in Africa as a basis for African integration and the establishment of the African Economic Community. ...

Other menu sections available from this link include: regions, regional, regional community, region, Regional Council, regional developmentand other search terms. They can be sorted by date or relevance. These are among the 50 search terms I use to produce this newsletter.

My name is Tom Christoffel. I've worked in the field of intergovernmental cooperation since 1973. As a consequence, "I see regions work." Regional Community Development News is published weekly based on news reports as of Wednesday.

Making visible analysis and actions at multi-jurisdictional regional scales is its purpose. "Think globally, act locally" was innovative in its time. Today the local scale is often too small to address today's needs and opportunities. "Think local planet, act regionally, " is my candidate paradigm. (No one said we're only allowed one paradigm.)

We can see that “regional communities” are organized locally and now act both to avoid tragedy in the commons and gain benefits. An effective multi-jurisdictional regional community has DNA: it is geographically Defined; has a common Name and its Alignment is inclusive of smaller communities and participatory in larger communities. So, by scanning this compilation, reading articles and checking organizations - you too will be able to see the regional communities that already exist.

News references are found using the Google News search service. Media article links are “fair use” to transform globally scattered reports to make regional approaches visible. Links go to the publisher and do not compete with it. Such publishers are likely to have related stories and thus be seen by new customers. “Regional” is an emerging news category. There is no charge for this service and no profit is made from its use, though any user can become more aware of the topic itself.

The system is based on a geocode scheme set up for earth that focuses on established political boundaries as a basis for regional grouping of nations, states and localities. It is decimal system based to take advantage of the sort criteria for numbers in computers. It utilized the Sector Group and Region codes of the United Nations and ISO. Geographic information system technology does not solve the problem, but its tools can be used with the geocodes.

The geocode system effectively organizes Wikipedia entries as a library management and the geocodes can be used for data aggregation. This has been developed under a Creative Commons license and would benefit from a global network implementation where local users cooperatively related subnational geographic regions and component political geography.

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Earth ( we know its a spherical whole)

Humanity's Local Planet

Universe Man at the Boundary

Local Planet - Regional Space

Our Local Planet has systems of Political Geographies which combine as Regional/Greater Communities

Universe Man's place on earth is local and regional silmultaneously depending upon the system of regions, sub-regions of the planet as local wholes: continents, nations, states, provinces, districts, counties, shires, municipalities. etc., which have local regions within and between them which are capable of being greater communities at many scales.

Based on my experience as a regional planner and agency director, 1973 -2008, and in recognition of emerging "regional communities," I developed three thoughts about community that relate to the challenge of working across-boundaries as greater or regional communities. The thoughts/theses apply for communities at the scale of bonding or bridging social capital as defined by Robert D. Putnam, which is alternately local or regional. (link below)

As of 2011, considering the global financial crisis brought about by pursuit of the "profit motive," it struck me that this has come to dominate modern life. This is a relatively new invention of civilization and wasn't a concern for most of the time that homo sapiens has been on the planet.

The three thoughts below that had emerged in my experience of working on regional cooperation now represent what I now posit as the "community motive." Concern about "profit" can emerge within an established community over time, but, to my mind the "profit motive" does not exist in the wild.

1) Community precedes cooperation.2) Community is how life solves all problems.3) Security is the primary purpose of community.

These three thoughts, theses if you will, are the basis of the "community motive." Following is some exposition about each one.

As I see it, security has always been the priority for humans since the plains of Africa. That's why communities first seek to establish defensible boundaries. After the basics are in place, security focus shifts to the social and economic. Boundaries work like the membrane in the osmosis experiment most of us have seen in a science class. The membrane is a filter that lets the good things pass through, but keeps unwanted things out. (Osmosis -YouTube - 45 sec.)

The evolved political boundaries of today have consequence. The rules change when you cross them. Though marked on the ground and fortified in some instances, they are conceptual, as pictured above, with Universe Man. The boundary divides the space between local, that within, and regional, everything outside, as labeled in the second panel. The third panel repeats the image within, to show, without graphic elegance, that the land on which Universe Man sits is regional at another scale, as determined by other boundaries, and another area that's local. A territory is both local and regional, depending upon the perspective.

Communities of communities, “regional communities” are greater communities organized to solve a problem, be it managing a watershed, strengthening an economic cluster or ensuring peer competition for school sports. Regional boundaries can be imposed for administrative purposes within states, but for these to be a basis for effective cooperation, a greater community sense is needed for that geography among the people. This is true for multi-state and multi-national regional communities as well. The leaders with such a vision can build a regional community by finding that which is already in place.

This is not to suggest that community is easy to build in order to solve problems. In a crisis, humans of any culture, belief or politics can quickly come together and self-organize to save themselves and others. It was the on-the- ground response to the 9/11 attacks that demonstrated to me the deep responsiveness of human community, as well as the fundamental importance of security. Community is how humans have always survived. This, I think, extends to all life forms.